


As the Memories Consume Me

by cadkitten



Category: Dir en grey
Genre: Abuse, Angst, Fluff, M/M, Violence
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2009-05-17
Updated: 2009-05-17
Packaged: 2017-12-03 23:20:59
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,073
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/703810
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/cadkitten/pseuds/cadkitten
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Places are sometimes the best triggers for memories. Some of them are good; some of them will consume you if you only let them.</p>
            </blockquote>





	As the Memories Consume Me

**Author's Note:**

> Prompt[s]: http://i23.photobucket.com/albums/b398/Sangha1211/FF%20challenge/IMG_8377_Savannah_GAbycharlestonbit.jpg | http://i23.photobucket.com/albums/b398/Sangha1211/FF%20challenge/DSC_0283byfonulyn.jpg | http://i23.photobucket.com/albums/b398/Sangha1211/FF%20challenge/dtsbyfreysan.jpg  
> Comments: for Visual Prompt Fanfic Challenge 2009 from **diru_nandemo**. Due May 31st.  
>  Beta Readers: kawaiikyo, elyachan  
> Song[s]: "Immaculate Crucifixion" by Juno Reactor

It's just standing here, crumbling away with the ages. Old bricks, pale tan and faded with age. There's a steady drip coming from a busted pipe shedding fluid onto the damp earth just outside the window. Musty... damp... decaying.

Time is rotting this place away even more than it has ever done to me. Five years alone and it already looks like someone should take a wrecking ball to it, tear it down and toss the remains in a garbage pile. Maybe the worst part is that it's obvious someone still lives here. The occasional flicker of light from another room, obviously lit by candles, the play of a shadow over the yellowed glass....

The sounds of the ocean behind me make it hard to hear anything from inside, but the yard at least gives away something. A child, specifically a girl, must live within. There's a doll lying forgotten in the rocky mud that once was a garden I tended with my own two hands, its blonde hair tangled up in the reddish clay of the earth, pink dress smudged with it, making the image seem almost macabre.

Something else flashes hard across my mind, stealing my breath for a single moment in time. Another place, another child... the scene so similar, yet so much more brutal. It's like staring at a reflection of my past; only this doll will be found, removed from the mud and the stains taken away from the dress with a cycle in the wash. A simple cleaning of the doll in some water will remove the evidence of neglect.

The place in my past... the child there... that cannot be undone. Even then, it couldn't be. Emaciated bones, a frozen night in the pouring rain, blood running from wounds of the abusive kind to mar the ground below with a murky red.

The agony of the moment seizes me and I find myself kneeling in the mud, the dampness leeching into the legs of my faded blue jeans. Even though it's cold, I can't seem to feel it, my mind whirling through the past, the journey through my thoughts reckless. It feels like I'm hurdling through every mental picture I ever took of those years of my childhood at a breakneck pace. Wind whips my face and my closed eyes water of their own accord.

My breath is stuck in my throat, lodging there and preventing me from taking in the much needed oxygen. White drifts into the blackness of my vision behind closed eyelids, flaring like the sun out from behind the clouds. My body sways slightly and I know I'm going to lose the battle for fresh air. The world spins even in my self-imposed darkness and then I can feel that I'm falling.

It feels like forever that I fall. I just keep going and going. And then there's strong arms around me, supporting me, keeping me from entrenching myself in the muddy earth I had been hurtling toward. A shudder rips through my body and my eyelids flutter for a moment as I suck in a much-needed breath. My lungs are stinging, filled to bursting as I catch a brief glimpse of my savior... my lover. Dark hair, brown eyes that could save the entire world... and all he ever chooses to save... is me.

I can feel his lips move over mine, a gentle caress of flesh against flesh; a kiss to save me from myself. I try to cling to reality, to reach back out and grasp what I've already let slip away. But it's a fruitless effort, wasted on the exhale of my breath into the wind as I lose that final thread and fall into unconsciousness.

-

It's hours later... I can tell even though we're no longer outdoors. The feel of the world around me has changed, the bustle of a big city surrounds me and I know he's taken me away from my memories, away from the place I continue to torture myself with. My head rests on his shoulder and from the crick in my neck I'd say it has been there the entire time.

Sitting up, I pull my jacket closer around me, huddling into it as I peer at him from under dark bangs. There's worry in his eyes, etched so deeply into the lines around them that I think they might never smooth out again. I do this to him... I push and push and push... and I never pull. He says I do sometimes, on those cold, lonely nights that I can never quite judge where I am or who I am. The way he tells it, I pull so hard and so close that he can never get away if he ever had the desire to. ... But he doesn't want to.

People come and people go, moving through the subway car as if nothing in the world is wrong. Everything is wrong... everything is crumbling... if only they'd wake up and notice it, they could stop it. I told the world that once, screamed it at them as loud as I could... but only the birds heard me, the ants on the roadway... and they could do nothing to change the direction of humanity.

We get out at our stop, his hand grasping mine so tightly that I know he doesn't want to ever let me go again. I stop, standing and waiting for the passengers to leave the station. The subway cars rattle off down the tracks, the whoosh of air blasting out behind them. I stand in silence, my back to the tracks, my eyes closed until I am certain no one remains but my lover and I. Slowly, I lift my head and allow myself to stare into the emptiness. It feels hollow and alone, no matter how much my mind tells me otherwise.

It's only then that it hits me, that it truly falls into place that I'm not at all like this place. I'm not even like the crumbling bricks of my past. Determination fills me like water filling a jug under the faucet. It builds and builds and swirls inside me until I'm bursting with it. My eyes meet his and I allow myself to see, for one split second, the hope that resides within them. This time, my lips meet his, my flesh caresses his... and all is right with the world.

**The End**  



End file.
